Hit the snooze button...

I was intrigued to see yesterday in my Google calendar described as Easter Monday (Regional Holiday) - what's with this "regional"?  Then I found, thanks to a friend of a friend, that it is not officially a holiday in Scotland - although many people and businesses treat it as such.  So I looked a little further into it, and it becomes more and more complex.  It seems that firstly you have to differentiate between public holidays and bank holidays.  Public holidays get their authority from the common law, and there are only two of them - Good Friday and Christmas Day.  Bank holidays get their authority (currently) from the Banking and Financial Dealings Act 1971 which specifies Easter Monday, the last Mondays in May and August and Boxing Day, but also provides for other dates to be added by Royal Proclamation - and New Year's Day and May Day have been added under this provision.  These dates however only apply in England and Wales - the Act specifies different schedules for Scotland and Northern Ireland to allow for things like St Andrew's and St Patrick's Days, and crucially for what we are discussing here, Easter Monday is not included in the Scotland list.